Kaiser Permanente Reform Committee Statement on the Opening of the Downey Medical Center

In a new era of transparency, Kaiser should inform their patients of the hazards that may negatively affect their health while visiting as an outpatient or staying overnight as an inpatient seeking medical care.

The new Kaiser Permanente Downey Medical Center courtesy: pfeilerassociates.com

(LOS ANGELES) - Kaiser Permanente began moving their patients from the seismically challenged Kaiser Bellflower Medical Center to the new Kaiser Permanente Downey Medical Center yesterday.

The Kaiser Permanente Reform Committee, the leading patient advocacy group that supports and provides patient advocacy for current Kaiser Permanente patients and the surviving families of patients who died at a Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, issued the following statement about the move.

“As we discuss health care reform and patient safety in our country, it is a tragic day when unknowing patients are moved from one unsafe medical facility to another dangerous Kaiser Permanente medical center without being informed of the toxic condition of the land and air quality within the location where they must now receive health care,” stated Kaiser Permanente Reform Committee President Vickie Travis.

"It is difficult to accept Kaiser Permanente’s promotion of their environmentally forward actions of using 100 percent fresh air and no recirculation, and the use of paint from non-toxic materials when the actual land that the hospital is built on is a documented toxic site."

Travis says that in a new era of transparency, Kaiser should inform their patients of the hazards that may negatively affect their health while visiting as an outpatient or staying overnight as an inpatient seeking medical care. They owe their patients that much.”

For more information:

kaiserpapers.info/Announcements/

kaiserpapers.org/Michele/index.html

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Sources

SEIU California State Council; 75% of California Hospitals Have at Least One Building that is a Collapse Hazard Building; Partial list provided by the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development Facilities Development Division; July 7, 2006; By California’s General Acute Care Hospitals in Accordance with the Alquist Hospital Facility Seismic Safety Act; Kaiser Foundation Hospital Bellflower seiucal.org/seismic/hospitallist.html

Downey Landing Document; Page 2; Site remediation is ongoing, and closure of the northern and southern PCE and TCE areas of groundwater and soil contamination is expected by 2010.

City of Downey Memo dated August 26, 2008 Subject: Soil Remediation Work; Groundwater beneath the site contains elevated concentrations of volatile organic compounds (VOCs); Page 1; In late March 2008, the weekly soil vapor sampling and testing revealed that previously undetected halogenated hydrocarbon compounds were being drawn from four of the eight extraction well casings; Page 2.

The Kaiser Permanente Reform Committee provides support for the Kaiser patient community. The KPRC projects are characterized by a collaborative, consensus based development process, an open forum, and a desire to protect and educate the public when involved in Kaiser medical care. We consider ourselves not simply a group of people with an altruistic desire to be of service to others, but rather a community of concerned citizens and users of the Kaiser Permanente Medical System.